poetry is a funny thing

Poem I just wrote. I was going to write about what this poem means to me, but it think it speaks pretty clearly for itself. Hope ya'll like it. 

You don’t love me like I love you

Maybe you did at one point

In the beginning

When it was new and special and we thought we had all the time in the world

The world was at our feet

We could do whatever we wanted

Be whoever we wanted to be

But the inevitable always happens

Mistakes made, hearts broken, lives shattered

The time you took for granted, the love you believed so fully in

Can never be found again

When the last of your tears is finally brushed away, your body wracked with dry sobs

When there’s no strength to fight, to even get out of bed

When you’re so resigned to brokenness that nothing, or no one, could ever put the pieces back together

When the only person you thought would always be there leaves and never looks back

That’s when it begins.

Life.

It may be imperfect

Scratch that. It’s guaranteed to be imperfect.

But that doesn’t mean there isn’t beauty in the imperfections, in the brokenness

The difficulty is in finding the strength to fight, in picking yourself up and finding the will to live again

Because that’s the point, isn’t it?

The purpose of life isn’t to be happy or successful or loved

The purpose of life is to be alive and living, truly living

time is a silly thing

So for those of you who don't know, I'm moving back to Kansas--in approximately 9 weeks. I can't believe it's that soon already.  (sidenote: I was just advised to move down there when I go visit for Thanksgiving. financially it does make more sense. I would have more time to settle in and could start my job at the restaurant, and working in food makes good money over the holidays. damn. more to think about.) I can't believe it's already that time though. kinda snuck up on me. I'm so excited. to be back. to be in school again. to be with my friends and family. don't get me wrong, I love Illinois. okay, I love the people in Illinois, not the actual state. the state kind of sucks. but the people have made it worth it. but I have to get back to Kansas. it's home. always has been, always will be. being away for the last several months has really given me perspective and now I'm anxious to get back. I suppose given my disorder I shouldn't use that word too liberally, but in this case it's necessary. I do have a little anxiety about going back, but hell what don't I have anxiety about these days? It's mostly a good anxiety too. like ya know when you're all hyped up on caffeine or whatever and you think you wanna run eight miles?  or like when you're so antsy waiting for something huge--whether you're about to get to your favorite part in your book, or your team's about to score the winning TD, or the moment right before your love kisses you--it's like that. the anticipation. the suspense. like I'm on the precipice of something great. I'm ready for the next chapter of my life. I know it won't be easy. but then life never really is, is it?

"For what it's worth...it's never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There's no time limit. Start whenever you want. You can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see the things that startle you. I hope you feel things you have never felt before. I hope you meet people who have a different point of view. I hope you live a life you're proud of, and if you're not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again."
---F. Scott Fitzgerald

I'm a ramblin man

I have to write. even when I don't want to. even when it hurts. even when I feel like falling apart. especially when I feel like I'm falling apart. I have to get it out. so I don't crumble and collapse. so I don't cut. so I don't lose hope. I don't understand anymore. my feelings are so jumbled and confused. about life. about my decision. about my past. about my future. I think about death everyday. I don't want to die. I just want to not exist anymore. to not be here. everything is wrong. all wrong. I wish I could melt away. into nothingness. into a black hole. I feel everything and nothing all at once. sometimes I'm so overwhelmed with despair I cannot move. other times I can be so filled with happiness and joy I want to scream. no one ever sees that side of me though. they only see the depression. I'm not bipolar. I can't be. doctors would have caught that right? though medication never really has worked before. maybe I wasn't doing it right. or maybe it was the wrong kind. it's possible I guess. I don't know. it's funny. I claim to hate people but I love without restraint. I love deeply and unconditionally. I never let go. I give chance after change. I hold onto hope even when it's clear there is none. I should probably learn to let go. everyone else is able to let go of me why can't I let go of them? I just want to feel normal. and not normal for me. regular people normal. I don't want my normal to consist of spiraling out of control and slicing my wrist open anymore. granted. I haven't cut in almost a year. (yay!) but I still think about it. every. single. day. I don't want to be this way anymore. I've been fighting for more years than I can remember now. for my life. for my survival. and I'm so tired. so tired. I just want it to be over. I don't want to fight anymore. I'm sick of pretending. sick of putting on a false smile and acting like everything is normal. like I'm normal. no one understands what I deal with everyday. most people anyway. some understand. sure. but where are these people? I guess that's why they have group therapy sessions. it's not like random people are going to come up to you and tell you their deep dark secrets. it's not like you can meet someone and just expect to have this close personal relationship right away. it scares people away when they know how complicated and troubled I really am. I don't even know how deep it goes. I don't like to think about it. because if I truly think about all my fears and anxieties and depressed thoughts and manic thoughts... I'll go crazy. literally. maybe I do need this group therapy thing. so I can meet people like me. they'd understand me. I did enjoy--okay. enjoy isn't the right word--but it was helpful for me when I was at the inpatient clinic. those people understood me. even though we were from different backgrounds and were different genders and ages and different issues--we understood each other. and loved each other regardless. it was so good for me to finally see that I'm not alone. I've had people telling me that my whole life. but didn't truly believe it till then. maybe I need to go back to a clinic. idk. those are expensive though. and I have a life to figure out. school. work. whatnot. I can't exactly take a vacation from life right now. as much as I'd want to. ugh. okay I'm done with my ramblings. sorry if this didn't make sense. it hardly makes sense to me. I just needed to get it out there. put it down in words.

"Write hard and clear about what hurts." --Ernest Hemingway.

Checking in...

These past several months have taught me more about myself than I ever could have thought possible; much more than I ever learned about myself in Kansas. It's not Kansas' fault though, or anyone in Kansas for that matter, it's my own fault. I don't know exactly when I lost myself. I can't pinpoint an exact time or day or event that I decided to stop being 'me'. But it happened. Slowly, over several years and traumatic experiences, I forgot who I am. Don't get me wrong, I don't regret anything, except maybe that I forgot who God was as well. I forgot that He's always there, I stopped trusting Him.

Although I've been through some shitty experiences, I understand now why everything had to happen. I've grown and learned and realized who my true friends and family are. I'm stronger, more resilient, more dependent on myself. Leaving has also taught me who I can truly rely on and who will always be there for me and never judge me. I open up more. I'd rather people know the real me upfront rather than wait until I'm falling apart for them to leave me. I've been through that a time or two. After just being discharged from the hospital after overdosing on sleep medication, I was being yelled at for my selfishness and inconsideration. The man who said he loved me and wanted to marry me was making me feel stupid and worthless. I should have told him long before that about my anxiety and depression. Silly me. Oh well, I'm quite indifferent towards him now. I used to be indifferent towards everything, but not anymore. 

When I moved to Illinois in March I wasn’t completely sure of my reasons. One day, as I was getting ready for church with my boyfriend, I said, "I really miss my dad, maybe I should move to Illinois. Maybe that's the solution to my problem." I said it almost jokingly, but just three weeks later, I was moving to Illinois. I'd wanted to move to Illinois to be with my dad since I was 14, but it just was never possible. The timing now was really perfect. I was taking a break from school, I'd just quit my job. Only downside was leaving my boyfriend. We tried long-distance, but it was too hard, and just didn't work. Leaving him was the hardest thing I've ever done. I will always love him, but I needed to leave Manhattan and Kansas. In order for me to gain perspective and get my footing back. I know God was calling me to Illinois. I needed to get my mental health back on track.

Now that I've gotten away from Manhattan, I can finally understand why I hated it so much. That was where it happened. That night when I wasn't given a choice. I had forgotten about that night, or rather I simply decided not to think about it. I had grown up going to Manhattan, loving K-State. While living there, I couldn't understand why I hated the place I used to love. Now I get it. Maybe one day I won't be so anxious in that city, but not anytime soon.

I do believe I'm ready to go back to Kansas though, to home. Kansas will always be my home, as much as I love Illinois. I always knew that living in Illinois wouldn't be permanent. I thought maybe I'll live here for a year or two, then move back home. Honestly, I figured it would take about that long to regain my footing and figure out my life, but maybe I'm stronger than I ever gave myself credit for. Though I know I could never have gotten even this far without the help and support of my God and family and friends.

I'm not saying I'll move back tomorrow or even in a month. I don't have a timeline. I do know that my decision will mostly depend on my school plans, but even that's up in the air. I've been making pros and cons lists, and I keep adding and subtracting items. I need to go home. As much as I love Illinois and my job and my coworkers and my family and all the friends I've made--Kansas will always remain my home.

Living here has been a dream come true. I know now that I can make it on my own, well mostly on my own. I was afraid that if I left after not being here longer that that would mean I failed. But I've realized that I didn't fail. The fact that I was able to even do this is a success in and of itself. I'm actually proud of myself and I don't say that very often.

Alright, I'm watching Harry Potter with my siblings so I'll write later. Sorry It's been so long. I've been so busy with work and everything, I never have time to write anymore. I'll do better!

Hannah :)

Miserable at best

So I have a mental disorder. Several in fact. I've been trying to hide them for as long as I can remember. I don't think I was even truly aware of them.  I just always knew there was something wrong with me, on the edge, lurking, ready at any moment to jump out and reveal itself, like monsters in the closet. Well after one too many tragedies in my life, sure enough, I fell apart. More like anxiety, depression, and dysthymia tore me to pieces. Those who knew me last semester know what happened and I don't really want to go into that right now... if ya wanna know, ask me.

I thought that after what happened, that I was better, fixed, whole. I didn't think I had to worry about those thoughts and feelings to come back.  Boy, was I wrong.  People ask me, "well why can't you just, ya know, stop?" haha. as if it was that easy.  If it was that easy I would be 100% fine. but it's not that easy, nothing ever is.  Even after medication, therapy, and even an inpatient clinic, I'm still hanging on by a thread.  So I thought moving away and transferring schools and work would help.  Just change my whole life.  Well, turns out it wasn't my life environment that was causing these breakdowns.  It was me.  I haven't been actually diagnosed, those are just what the doctors tell me I probably have, but I think it's the chemicals in my brain.  At least, that makes the most sense.  Though, fixing those chemicals are harder than I originally thought.  I thought, "I'll take some medication for awhile and get back to being a-okay in a few months." wrong again.  Anyone seeing a pattern here?

It's coming back.  The anxiety, the depression.  And I suppose the dysthymia never really left.  That's when you have an inability to feel or to describe how you feel.  You're sort of always in this flatlined, apathetic state.  It's fairly annoying.  Especially when you want to feel excited or happy or upset, and you can't. These emotions are expected, and it's strange when someone doesn't show them.  So people get the wrong messages from me all the time.

I don't know how to make it go away. More therapy? New medication? Hell, maybe I need to go back to the mental clinic for a month.  All I know is I can't keep living like this.  Something needs to change.  Most likely my own way of thinking though.  But with mental disorders...it's hard to control what your brain does or does not think about.  Trust me, some days I can barely get out of bed let alone try to be positive about my life.

acceptance or tolerance?

49...

That's the score I got. Not very impressive.

According to the book, scores in the range of 85-100 are incredibly accepting of others, and scores in the range of 66-84 are the average scores of the majority of the people. Apparently I'm not very accepting of others.  Specifically, the book says that people who score from 0-65 "may be very cautious about and intolerant of others." Of course, those who know me know how true that is of me.  I've just had so many experiences that taught me not to trust others, to be wary of how others treat me, which I guess to some degree is a good thing.  People who are too accepting or trusting of others tend to be incredibly naive.

Our world today has become too tolerant of others, which to some people means acceptance, but it's not.  Just because you tolerate something doesn't mean you necessarily like it.  I tolerate this damn Kansas weather, but I absolutely hate it.  People nowadays, myself included, need to become more accepting of others.  Just because you're different from someone or have different beliefs or opinions doesn't make either one of you better or worse than the other.  Just makes you different.  And that's perfectly fine.  I, myself, love being different.  I think normal is just too damn boring.

Well, this post is a little disorganized. Oh well, I'm not worried about it.

social justice

So for my Skills and Techniques class the other day we were supposed to research the Warren Hill incidence that happened the other day... this is what I found on it 

Warren Hill is an African American male imprisoned in Georgia.  He was originally convicted on shooting and killing his girlfriend, and was sentenced to life imprisonment.  While in prison, he killed his cellmate by beating him with a nail-spiked board.  He was granted a stay of execution because he is developmentally disabled; however, I read one article that disagreed with that.  They said that the punishment should fit the crime not the person.  They said that since he was competent enough to murder two people that it’s okay, even just, that he be executed.  I disagree with them though.  I believe that since he was declared mentally retarded, he was not fully aware of his actions, and if he was he didn't know the true implications of what he was doing.  I believe without a reasonable doubt that he killed those two people, but I also believe that he shouldn't be put to death for his actions.  Neither do I believe that he should get away with it and be free to go.  He needs to be rehabilitated and put under state custody.  If he’s killed twice now, who’s to say he wouldn't kill again. He needs help though, not death.